Goodnight, Travel Well
by Teller1789
Summary: Blair makes a sacrifice.


Warning: This is a death story. A major character dies. It is not happy.

He knows what other people think about him. He's heard their whispers.

He's at a point in his life now where none of that matters. He'd be lying if he said that had always been the case, but that's dangerously close to a status quo, a predicted pattern of behavior: the Inherent Paradigm.

This isn't about that.

_The frequency of these situations can't be natural. Statistical probability alone rules out such odds. Besides that, no one's luck is this _consistently_ shitty. _

_His personal theory follows more along the perpendiculars of Fate than the parallels of Chance. _

_So the problem is presented: _

_How does one city attract so much trouble? _

_Bounty hunters and hostage takers. _

_Honestly. This is _Washington_. _

He's been writing his dissertation for three and a half years. He's luckier than most of his colleagues. Not many anthropology graduate students have the benefit of a living-breathing "throwback," a direct link to their research.

He should be done. He's had plenty of time to observe, document, and record.

This isn't about that.

It hasn't been for a long time.

_The street is completely disserted. He assumes most of the innocent bystanders took off after the first shots were fired. _

_On the sidewalk, police cars are parked haphazardly up against shop windows. _

_Tires are run up over curbs, doors stand open, keys dangle in the ignition, their jagged teeth clinking softly against the dash. _

_Hiding behind a pregnant woman and an overturned SUV, the gunman fiddles with his automatic rifle. It doesn't glint in the sun. It just sits against his side, dull and lethal. _

_It's an old-fashioned, rough and tumble stand -off. _

He's had a Jim dream. Not a dream about Jim, but a dream like the ones Jim sometimes has.

His Sentinel has told him a little bit, little bits of it. But not much. He doesn't push, though. Jim always gets this soft look in his eyes when he talks about it.

Not gentle soft. Broken soft, splintered and leaked. His eyes darken. Their bitter color dulls to dark blue. Drowning blue.

His Jim dream was tinted green. And bright. So bright, everything had its own shimmer. His eyes had burned and he'd woken with salt dried in the pores of his cheek.

He'd spoken to the Wolf. He doesn't know its name.

"The Sentinel protects his territory. The Guide protects the Protector." Wolf said.

Blair had woken with splinters of green Jim dreams caught in his eyelashes.

_Jim told him to stay in the truck. Blair told him to be careful. _

_Neither one of them listened, so Blair thinks that's something at least. Justification, if nothing else, and an excuse at worst. _

_Jim's walking out into the street, arms raised to show that he's unarmed. Jim is an idiot. He does not know his place. _

_He is an ex-army captain. He is a detective with the Cascade, Washington P.D. _

_He is a Sentinel, a modern embodiment of an ancient power. He is enhanced. He is unique. _

_He is _not_ a fucking hostage negotiator. _

Blair has never told Jim about his Expendability Theory. It would be unfair to Jim.

It would be unfair to explain to Jim, in scientific detail and with appropriately labeled charts, why he should be willing to give up his Guide for the sake of Cascade.

Why his happiness should matter less than theirs. Because he is Chosen, because he is Gifted, because he nearly died in a helicopter crash and was left alone to wander around the Peruvian jungle with only ghosts and guilt for company.

Jim has already lost so much. Family. Friends. Lovers.

His fucking dignity.

Seriously. The guy can't even _eat_ without worrying about going into a mini-coma.

So it's unfair really, for Blair to lay it out there. Show Jim in black-and-white print how fragile his hard-earned equilibrium is.

Still, this isn't about that.

_The pregnant woman is gone. Blair watched Jim make the deal. He took the pregnant woman's place. She was rushed away by a phalanx of Cascade's finest, put safely away in a police car. _

_Jim is now sitting behind the overturned SUV with the gunman. He has the barrel of an automatic rifle pressed into the delicate skin behind his left ear. _

_Blair wonders how high Jim is dialed up. He doesn't look zoned, so Sandburg thinks maybe it's okay for now. Except it's not and Blair can't ever remember being this angry. _

_He gets up to follow Jim, like always, but fingers wrap firmly around his arm. The dark hand bunches his flannel sleeve and Blair stumbles backward a bit, against the force holding him down. _

"_Sandburg." Simon warns. _

"_You promised me." Blair reminds the captain. _

_And he had. He had promised. _

Blair waited until Jim was busy down in Interrogation before going into Simon's office. Simon was surprised. Usually, Jim was the medium through which he and the observer interacted. Without Ellison there, Simon was unsure of his relationship to the observer.

Boss. Advisor. Surrogate protector. All three.

"I need a favor, man." Blair said.

Simon said nothing. Most of the time, it was best to let Sandburg get out of his own way before interrupting. Simon lit a cigar and waited.

"I need you to promise me that you'll be here if I'm not."

Simon puffed.

"For Jim, I mean." Blair added and tugged on the curl closest to his cheek.

"Don't let Ellison hear you say that." Simon advised. He didn't know what the kid was worked up about but fatalism didn't seem like his typical M.O.

"It's all explained here." Blair took a manila envelope from his ratty backpack.

"You can look at it later. I just need you to promise me now."

Simon thought about ordering Sandburg out of his office. He looked over his glasses, right into the kid's face.

Mistake.

Sandburg's eyes were big and serious. And still.

Before, Simon would get dizzy looking at Blair because he could see all that energy and intellect whirling and whipping. It was all there right behind his eyes, chasing across his face.

Now in front of his desk, Sandburg was still. Fully focused, intent. For once his mind was rooted firmly in this idea, this moment.

"What?" He asked.

Blair showed him.

_The gunman knows he's lost. A lost cause. _

_There are maybe twenty or thirty guns aimed at him, not including the snipers. _

_His bargaining chip is about five times bigger than he is. _

_Worst of all, he can't even remember the reason for it all. He'd had a goal. Money, he thinks, or glory but he forgot some of it when he touched the pregnant woman's belly and felt the baby kick. The rest got lost in the echo of gunfire. _

"_What do I do?" He asks the big guy. _

"_Let me walk." The cop says. "When I'm clear, put down the gun slowly. Get on your stomach, hands over your head. You didn't kill anyone. You still have a chance." _

_The gunman nods. _

_He's still got a chance. _

The Expendability Theory by Blair J. Sandburg

Cascade needs its Sentinel.

Cascade's Sentinel needs a guide.

There is one True Sentinel.

There are many possible guides.

In Conclusion: "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few…or the One."

_The gunman lets Jim walk. _

_Everyone relaxes. Blair eases down. Simon lets go of his arm. Trigger fingers twitch away. _

_Jim is almost back to the police line when the gunman forgets. _

_He forgets what Jim told him. Something dark and ugly rises up in his gut, curls around his brain stem and niggles at repressed instinct. _

_He wants to see blood. _

_He raises the gun, fast and practiced. He's not an amateur. _

_They were foolish. _

_Blair is already running and Simon's hand isn't quick enough. He scrapes his knuckles against the asphalt. _

_The gunman pulls the trigger but its unique reverberation is lost in the thunder of sniper fire. _

Blair would never hurt Jim. Never.

Though, honestly, he's in the best position to do so.

It is ironic, by his estimation. This is a big deal because Blair doesn't wield irony like a badge of hipster honor like some of his New Age contemporaries. Blair truly finds it _ironic_ that even though Jim became more _than_ human in Peru it wasn't until he met Blair that he was more _of_ a human.

It's not bragging. It's fact. To be truthful, Blair is more now, too, after knowing Jim.

It's a fair trade, an equal exchange.

Which is why this _thing_ between them is so messy.

All of Jim's sharp, broken pieces have been absorbed into the "Sandburg Zone." Molded and smoothed into intricate, cutting things: jagged still on the outside but warm and safe on the inside.

Utterly protected.

And Blair's eccentricities (numerous) were taken in stride. He's never had a dad or a big brother or a protector, especially not a blessed one. He's never had a home.

Blair had managed okay on his own, until now.

He can't be alone anymore and for the first time it feels like relief instead of limitation.

No, he'd never hurt Jim. Unless he has to.

Essentially, Blair Sandburg is a selfish bastard.

This is precisely what it's about.

_Blair flops against Jim's back, undignified. On the way down, he accidentally kicks Jim in the back of the knee. _

_Jim falls down on top of Sandburg which is why at first, everyone is confused. _

_There are two bodies on the ground_._ Blood, a lot of it, is coming from _somewhere_. _

_Jim gets up first, mostly because Blair has a bullet in his back. _

_Later, when the blood is dry they will see that it ripped through his right shoulder and came out at an angle, very close to his heart. _

_The exit wound is messy. It's torn Blair's chest open. _

_Fortunately, the deep blood that comes up from the wound is so red that it covers the grotesque sight of exposed innards. _

_Unfortunately, the moment Jim smelled Blair and gunpowder, his senses dialed up to maximum. _

_He can feel a zone-out coming on. It's gradual, most likely prolonged by shock. _

_Sight. Red. _

_Smell. Iron. _

_Taste. Salt_

_Touch. Cold_

_Sound. Stay. Don't leave me. _

_Jim can't do it. He slips away into a zone. _

_There is no one to bring him out. _

_Blair reaches out, at the end, to Jim. He wants to touch. And hear. He wants to know he's not alone. _

_Jim is already gone. _


End file.
